Page:Cassell's Illustrated History of England vol 1.djvu/37

TO A.D. 420.] Roman Wall, many varieties of this peculiar tooling, or "broaching," occur, along with ornamental mouldings, &c., and inscribed slabs, one of which has been cut to form the semi-circular head of a doorway. The beautiful fragment of a capital also given was found in the station of Cilurnum (now Walwick Chesters). It has probably belonged to the portico of a temple. It appears to be a late variety of Corinthian or composite. It serves to show that there must have been considerable expense bestowed on these stations, which were, in fact, military cities, in which the commanders resided. The doorway given at page 19, from the station of Bird-Oswald, is valuable as showing a peculiar form of door-head, cut out of a solid stone. It forms the entrance to the guard-chamber from the gateway of the station.



The Roman altars, sculptured fragments, inscribed stones, coins, implements of war, articles of personal ornament, utensils for domestic use, &c., which have been found along the line of the wall, are extremely numerous.





have now arrived at a period when an event occurred which infused a new element into the population of Britain, and was destined to have a powerful influence in her history, her progress, and her literature. The island had not long recovered its independence before it suffered, in common with the rest of Europe, from the dreadful scourges of pestilence and famine, which thinned its population—a circumstance of which the Picts and Scots, the restless and unpitying enemies of the Britons, were not slow to take advantage. They made frequent inroads into Britain, plundering and devastating the country, and inflicting the most cruel depredations and sufferings upon the inhabitants. So great was the terror inspired by these atrocities, that whole districts and towns were abandoned by their inhabitants, who fled like sheep before the fiery Picts and Scots.

In this extremity Vortigern, one of the most powerful of the British kings, had recourse to an expedient which he borrowed from the Romans, whose emperors had long been accustomed to take the barbarians into their pay—that of calling in the Saxons to their aid. So runs the old and not improbable legendary account of this so-called invasion of the Saxons. On the other hand, it is likewise a very plausible account of the landing which represents this band of Saxons who first came to Britain as escaping from the disturbances of the continent, while Attila and his Huns were ravaging Western Germany. In the mixture of both these accounts the real truth probably lies hid. The Saxons were glad to leave the continent, at this time so disturbed, and so they readily accepted the invitation given by Vortigern to come to Britain. These Saxons were a tribe of Scythians, who were a branch of that great German family whose customs, and habits, and language gradually permeated almost every European state, working a mighty change in the component elements of countries, the influence of which is clearly discernible even at the present day.

The similarity of the Saxon language, in some respects, to that of the Persians and ancient Indians, seems to some to be sufficient reason for believing that the Saxons were originally of Oriental origin, in which case it is conjectured that Saces, on the Indus, was the source whence they derived their name. The earliest mention, however, of the Saxons in history, describes them as neighbours of the Danes, south of the Cimbrian Chersonesus: and it is most probable that their name was really derived from sachs, an axe.

Here it is impossible not to be struck by the wonderful unity which characterises all the designs of Providence—the fitness of the means to the end proposed. In the same manner as the Jews were disciplined to become a nation by their sojourn of forty years in the desert, so were the Saxons gradually led to follow a maritime life from the localities in which they had settled; and this finally led to the conquest of Britain, destined, from its geographical position, to be one day the centre of the commerce of the world.

Rude and savage as were our forefathers, they possessed one redeeming virtue: women were respected amongst them; polygamy was a law unknown; the wife was the companion and friend of her husband, not the slave; and we have never 